


Ladder Man

by GrittyLegitty



Category: SMPLive
Genre: Death, Existentialism, Murder, One Off, POV Third Person, SMPLive - Freeform, kinda drags im sorry, liberal use of metaphors, murder fic, obviously, only schlatt and ryan actually appear, use of weapons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-07
Updated: 2019-12-07
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:14:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21705040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GrittyLegitty/pseuds/GrittyLegitty
Summary: Just an SMPLive Hunger Games AU type thing I wrote based on a dream.Warning for gore and graphic description of death.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28





	Ladder Man

**Author's Note:**

> This was just an idea I wanted to write based on a dream I had.  
> I labelled it as a 'Hunger Games' AU when honestly the only thing it shares in common is killing, it's kinda obvious that the attitudes towards it and the way it works are different but that doesn't matter, this was just writing practice for me and consistency isn't something I'm too bothered abt.  
> This is a one-off thing after all, and I hope y'all enjoy it.
> 
> ✌️

They called him the ladder man.  
Guy could climb almost anything, call him a ram, a goat, whatever.  
Mountains, trees, a societal hierarchy, you name it and he could scale it in less time than it'd take you to ask him.  
Though, of all things, his footing was most secure when climbing business ranks. He had everything he needed: a level head, practicality, greed.  
He was a hat-trick of unpleasantness.  
He was impersonal in only the way that mattered, and carried an unsettling air of charm to cover his tracks.

That had landed him here.  
In these grounds, beneath these trees, hiding in ten feet off the ground, ever eager to stay over everyone else. He regretted none of it, because he was certain, and maybe a bit too big for the boots on his feet, but that was probably a good thing going about the hazardous stepping stones of the hell hole he'd set himself up to fall into.  
He was here for the money, here for the fame, here for the publicity.  
He wasn't going to die.  
It wouldn't take much effort for him to outsmart all his rivals, he was much more capable than everyone after his throat and he knew it.  
He knew he was going to win.  
So why hadn't it happened yet?

That was something he asked himself every night, every night when he settled down to sleep in a tree and angrily picked the bark out from under his fingernails.  
Why hadn't he won yet?  
Actually, better yet, why was no-one challenging him?  
This was a fight to the death, but everyone was running from their victories.  
Wasn't this supposed to be a bloodbath?  
After all, he wouldn't mind getting his hands dirty. He wouldn't have participated if he didn't have full confidence that he'd come out on top, and he'd enjoy it.  
Being caught red handed was something he was good at, but something he was even better at was worming himself out of a sticky situation and, what with the metallic smell of blood he'd imagined, he was sure this would be the stickiest situation of them all.  
He wanted to fight.  
He wanted someone to take him head on and give him a chance to prove to the audience he was the only choice for victor.  
Undoubtedly they loved him, there was no way that they couldn't, yet he'd still not had his time to shine.  
So, if they wouldn't give it to him, he'd make one for himself.

He sighed and looked pointedly at the drone hovering around the treetop, sticking his tongue out playfully. They were watching.  
They were expecting a show, he was expected to put on a show and theatrics was something he prided himself in.  
He'd give them more than they'd bargain for, more than they could ever expect from a scrawny, greasy-looking businessman who looked the most out of place amongst the more brutal looking candidates.  
He'd teach them all not to judge a book by its cover.  
The only thing was that he didn't know how.  
As of yet, nobody had died. There hadn't been a single siren, nor had he even seen another candidate.  
Well, one person had died, but that was right at the start, right at the start and it didn't count, everyone and everything he'd seen at the start didn't count.  
He was desperate to kickstart the action, cause a domino affect if you will, and itched to finally get his hands on somebody or, better yet, around their neck.  
Slow and painful deaths were what he thought best, put a show for the people at home, but right now he'd be fine with the chance to put a bullet through someone's head and have it over with if it meant getting the chance to do something.

He was sick of being idle.  
At this point, he wasn't even hiding.  
He knew that anyone that wasn't scared of him, as they should rightfully be, he could take in a fight. He knew that anyone who had the gall to attack right off the bat probably wasn't the smartest, and was someone he could outwit.  
So where was everyone?  
Where were they?  
"Where are they?"  
He whispered to the drone, the drone that wasn't a drone but a bee, and just like the drone wasn't a bee, he wasn't fucking stupid.  
He looked at it imploringly, staring at the warped reflections of light that shone from its abdomen and imagining himself staring someone right in the eye.  
The bee circled him, and he followed it with his eyes, cracking a smile he probably didn't have the right to wear.  
It may have been cold, it may have been wet and miserable and maybe, right now, he didn't fancy being there, but he had the prefect way to keep his morale up.

He stared up into the sky and saw nothing but and endless stretch of black and blue. The sky was one giant bruise, mapped with the patterns of leaf silhouettes that gave the view a wonderful mottled effect, like a mosaic but much softer, something much more natural.  
He was deep into the night.  
People that had sense were bound to be getting sleep, because as much as staying alert is important, it's a lot easier to dodge a throwing knife when you aren't asleep on your feet.  
People that had sense would have taken themselves out of the way. The arena was his oyster, his show stage, and he could do whatever he pleased with it.  
He stood up, steadying himself against the damp tree trunk and shaking the leaves out of his hair, making sure to keep acknowledging the camera, making sure the crew stuck around.

He pinged his bowstring against his chest with a smug half smile.  
"Hey," he swung himself around the branch, holding on tight enough that his knuckles turned white, "they call me Schlattniss Everdeen."  
That was the first joke he'd made since he was dumped here, and he was proud of it. That was probably the first time he'd smiled, too, because the rest of his time here had been spent gathering supplies, and failing to hunt down his fellow competitors.  
His confidence had never dwindled though, not one bit, and he hoped every ounce of his courage shone through with that smile because he knew he was going to win, and he needed his audience to be in on the secret too.

He chuckled, climbing down the tree. Its jagged surface dug deep into the flesh of his hands, he could feel his palms stinging, raw, but it made him feel alive; the thrill of the pain and having an ever-present audience left his blood buzzing through his veins like liquid static and he'd never want to feel any other way.  
He smiled at the hovering drone, the bee buzzing around his head at a distance enough, he guessed, to get a nice full body shot. He posed for the camera, interlacing his fingers under his chin and grinning with bared teeth, before he moved to leave, just as a test.  
Just a little bit of a test.  
The buzzing followed him, maybe a bit more than followed but intently tracked. He had the audience right under his bloody, calloused, grubby little thumb, and he smiled for it.  
He wanted to keep them there, so he faked straightening a tie, his nonchalance, and walked through the trees with his thumb hooked through the bowstring.

The pinging sound of that against his thin waterproof jumpsuit was the only sound other than the damp, eerie ambiance that accompanied being in a place so overrun with nature yet so devoid of life. All he wanted to hear was voices, talking, a campfire, or better yet hear someone crying, but none of those were what he got.  
Just a sharp yet muffled ping, over and over and over until he was certain he'd attract at least someone's attention, but his luck seemed to have run out. The drone had gone and left him in silence, listening to water drip from trees and his own blood rushing through his ears.  
The cucks.  
They'd come back if they knew what was best for them.  
They didn't know what they were missing out on, and maybe he'd have to show them.  
He pulled the bow from around his shoulders and gripped it in contemplation, looking at the contrast of the dry, cracked skin on his hands and the shining, fleeting drops of water. A weapon wasn't much use when there was no one around to use it on.

He stared around, rotating on the spot, looking for the slightest sign of movement, whether that be an animal or a person.  
Nothing.  
He gripped the bow tighter, holding it at his side. Something had to give. There was no reason for it to be this quiet; he felt like this was a build up to something, and not knowing what it was made the static from his blood dance in his fingertips.  
It made him feel powerful, and he took that in stride.  
He continued to walk through the trees, listening intently to everything going on in the background swamped by the ringing of his ears. There wasn't anything he hated more than silence, or being idle, he couldn't stand it. It made the hairs on his back want to pull themselves away, but he guessed hearing silence right now is probably a good thing. Still, he wanted to make noise to fill the void.  
So he carried on walking, stepping intentionally on leaves and sticks, listening to them crunch beneath his boots and imagining he was walking through a wasteland of bones, coming out as the victor.  
He didn't even need to imagine it, he knew that's what was going to happen anyway; that would be his reality, and he couldn't wait to get his first taste of blood.  
He couldn't wait to stand victorious over a corpse and stomp their skull in for the fun of it.  
He wanted blood to flow, bones to crunch, and he wanted to feel it all, wanted to look back on what he'd done and know that he'd done it.

But he wouldn't be able to do that yet, no siree, because everyone in this arena was a coward.  
The best he had was a huge, rotting corpse that made him stop in his tracks in surprise.  
Suddenly he couldn't see the woods anymore, all he could see was the outline of a colossal ribcage and his senses were overwhelmed by the smell of rotting and decay, like death itself had just shown its ugly face.  
He could hear the drone again, hovering somewhere nearby, and for once his attention was away from his audience and more focused on, entranced by, this… thing. This thing he'd stumbled across, a great looming body, slumped over in the foliage.  
He could feel his face twist.  
It stared up at him with hollow eye sockets, the ridges of with were decorated with moss and algae; where once there were eyes, there are now vines and flies that've taken their place. Pieces of the skull looked to be missing, chipped away, stolen, leaving it looking like a rough porcelain ornament left to be taken by time, by the forest, but it wasn't.

The skull was huge. It was a ram's skull, but the curl of the horns themselves were easily much bigger than his head, and the body was gigantic too; splayed out, contorted, the thing looked demonic, huge hooves with rotting flesh hanging from them like some unenthusiastic party decorations.  
It looked proud to look so horrible, it grinned up at him with its curved jaw and perfectly straight teeth.  
It stared through him.  
He dug his thumbs into the sockets and pried it from the grip of the ivy, staring back, not even caring if he was exposed to the open because all that mattered to him now was this oversized skull that was very heavy to hold. He didn't know what kind of ram this was, he wasn't sure he wanted to either, but it fascinated him.  
The drone buzzed closer.  
He could almost hear the game makers laughing to themselves at his surprise, knowing they'd set him up to fall into that trap, to be instilled with fear, or something that tasted like fear but wasn't quite that.  
They thought they'd caught him with something, but they hadn't, because the first thing he did was place the skull on the ground and state at it some more.  
It didn't scare him, it was dead.  
It was dead and it couldn't hurt him.  
To prove that, he took an arrow from his sheath and drove it home right into the centre of its head, feeling the bone give way, the eye sockets crumble in on themselves.  
It crumbled, and he watched; must've been an old bastard, he guessed, if he could shatter it so easily.  
He kicked the remains aside and stared out into the darkness, knowing but not caring that the drone was hovering near what was left of it, but it peaked his interest when the drone started to drift away.  
It drifted away but slowly, with intent.  
Wherever the drone went with intent, there was bound to be someone of interest.  
Someone of interest that wasn't him?  
That made him a bit upset… maybe a bit angry.

He followed it.  
Followed the buzzing, followed the only other sound he could hear that wasn't his own breathing or his pulse in his temples.  
It wormed between the trees, and he followed, scraping his hands on the tree bark and feeling the branches whip him back as he pushed them out of the way.  
His footing was less steady now, he didn't want to lose it.  
He didn't want to lose his chance to take out what could be considered competition.  
The drone hovered nearby.  
At first, he wasn't sure what was going on.  
It had stopped moving, why had it stopped moving? It stopped moving in a clearing and hovered there, and he stared at it expectantly.  
It stared back.  
He felt less like he was wooing the audience now, but he had to find a way to try, like everyone was in on a joke that he was left out of, or that he was the butt of.  
He could feel their eyes on him, and for once he didn't know what to do. He didn't know what was expected of him and the static in his veins hardened into a heavy iron that weighed him down.

Then he caught sight of it.  
Picking out little details was something he specialised in, considering all the contracts he dealt with; attention to detail came naturally when he spent his days writing and reading fine print and making very sure he didn't fuck himself over, which was what he very nearly did.  
It was a trap.  
A well hidden one at that, but he could see the blade in the trees, hidden behind all the branches and pulled taut with a well disguised rope. Now, traps weren't something he had experience with building, so he couldn't safely disarm it without setting it off, risking his life, so now he felt like he was walking on eggshells, even though he knew he wouldn't fall for it. He wasn't going to fall for it.  
It wasn't going to kill him.  
He circled at a distance, now more confused than he was before.  
The drone hovered close to the trap and he suddenly felt a lurch in his gut that told him they wanted entertainment via his death, a though that he forced out of his head.  
That didn't stop it from making him feel sick to his stomach though.  
The drone didn't move, and he grew even more uneasy. Maybe they were waiting for him to die.  
No.  
They knew he knew that trap was there, and they knew he knew they knew that and that he wasn't going to die, he wasn't going to die to a trap of all things. He wasn't that pathetic, wasn't as pathetic as he looked.  
Then he heard a noise: a snap, a rustle above his head that jerked his head upwards to see movement; the branches were shaking, like someone was clambering through them.  
He looked back at the drone, at the trap, and back at the drone again.  
What if they knew he was here?  
Ha, he doubted that. They'd have ambushed him by now. He'd be dead by now, but he wasn't.  
Maybe God was real, maybe God was on his side.

There was a cliff-looking thing beside the trap, and Schlatt knew exactly why. The trap was designed to launch knives, to pin their victim against a solid surface. Then they could be finished off, gutted like a frog prepared for dissection, and they'd have less chance of escaping. Clever, but he was cleverer.  
Now all he had to do was deal with the fucker that set this up. He stared at his own blood-covered, dusty, scab covered hands and back at the rock face, knowing this would be a pain to climb. It would hurt, it would hurt a lot, but maybe rubbing salt in your own wounds was preferable than leading yourself to your own death. He grabbed onto the nearest jutting surface and hauled himself up.  
It stung, strained the muscles in his arms, made him feel like this wasn't worth it, but this was going to be his first kill, not to mention he had an audience watching him, the drone's low hum being a constant reminder of that.

He reached the top. It was lighter up here, the natural light of night-time less dimmed by the cover of trees that the tops of barely reached his kneecaps now. Everything was lit by a dusky kind of blue, the kinda thing that made you nostalgic but you could never understand why. It was quiet, but the trees were still rustling, and he was following.  
He hid behind a rock, behind a boulder congregation of sorts, and squinted through the darkness.  
Whoever it was, they weren't facing him, but they were surrounded by a nest-like structure and sitting on top of the mess they'd made like it was a throne and they were the king. They even looked to be wearing a crown woven from ivy, twigs and leaves. That could just be for camouflage, but he wouldn't put that past anyone in this arena.  
They seemed cocooned in their own world both literally and metaphorically, hidden away from the world in a little ball of knotted branches and stuck in their own little daze, completely unaware of his presence even though he'd caused a mini rockslide on his way up here.  
For a split second, they turned to the side and he could recognise that face profile anywhere: it was Ryan, famous for having only one eye, and that eye he had for architecture.  
As much as Schlatt specialised in business, Ryan specialised in building, constructing, and he had the utmost respect for that.  
However, there was also no doubt in his mind that he was the one that set the trap that could very well have cut his game short.  
He stared holes through the back of Ryan's head while Ryan fiddled with whatever he was doing, looking to be digging a knife into the knot of a tree, apparently so determined to secure his safety for the future that he's not considering his safety in the moment, crouched precariously in the tree, barely clinging onto the branch with his thighs.  
He was like a fresh apple for the picking, or ready to be picked off; it would have been like shooting a sitting duck if ducks were ever found sitting high in trees.

Schlatt hooked his finger into his bowstring, staring, staring through the gap in the rocks and thinking, planning out something premeditated when, if anything, the murder should have been quick, brutal.  
His audience obviously didn't want to watch him stare at his target for half an hour, they wanted blood to be spilled and weapons to fly.  
As long as someone died, they'd be happy.  
That person wouldn't be him.  
He pulled the bow off his shoulder, slowly, carefully, because he didn't want the rustling of his own jumpsuit to drown out the. thrashing of the leaves as Ryan shifted about the branches.  
The string was pulled taut, his finger near his eye, the arrow was aimed right at the back of his skull, the base where it met his spine.  
He imagined him pinned to the tree like a moth to a display, imagined how much his arrow would fuck his face up, like he'd been curb-stomped horizontally, right against the tree trunk.  
He grins, releases.  
The bowstring snaps.  
It whips back, striking his cheek.  
The arrow veers off to the side.  
Through his stinging eye, his fingers clawed over it, he sees Ryan turn at the sound of his yelling, or in surprise at the sudden appearance of an arrow.

Fuck.

It takes both of them a few seconds, a few seconds to react. Ryan is the first, using the tree trunk to haul himself to his feet and Schlatt's heart drops; he feels it pool into a bloody mess somewhere below his lungs.  
Ryan wields the knife, hesitates to throw it, and Schlatt takes that time to pull another arrow from his sheath and lunge.  
If he didn't kill Ryan, Ryan would kill him, Ryan would kill him just like he planned on killing Ryan.  
It had just dawned on him.  
He didn't want to die.  
What came next was a surprise: Ryan screamed.  
Idiot, did he want to attract attention?  
No-one would help him, if anything they'd try to kill him first because there's no way anyone would rather try to take him out over smaller, weaker Ryan.  
"No, no!"  
Schlatt wielded the arrow, gripped like a spear in both hands. Ryan scrambled across the thick branch that just barely connected the rockface and the tree, holding his knife like it was a dagger. Scrambling away.  
Schlatt couldn't have that.  
He ran to the branch, treading like its knots were mines on a minefield, only to look up to see Ryan's feet disappearing as he climbed further up the tree, using his knife as leverage to escape.  
Coward.

He followed, feeling the bark reopen his wounds, feeling it sting. He felt his own blood spill between the creases of his palms and yet he persisted, he kept climbing, chasing the soles of Ryan's boots.  
Ryan kept glancing down nervously. His head was always tilted at an angle, so his one eye could spy him properly, unknowingly slowing himself little by little, but not enough that Schlatt could catch him yet, no matter how much he swiped and clawed to catch his feet.  
Come to think of it, maybe he was slowing himself down too.  
Ryan was getting further and further away, gaining more distance, yet he was forcing himself higher into the tree, further into danger. Essentially, he was cornering himself into a place where the only place to go was down, but then again fear does strange things to a person.  
Schlatt was about to take his chance, to lunge, to knock him, do anything to him, when the branch Ryan stood on snapped under him. A blue blur screamed past him.  
There was a yell that made his blood jump under his skin, that made him cling a little tighter to the branches in his hands no matter how much more it hurt.  
Looking down gave him vertigo.  
All he could see was a mess of brown and green, and his own body twisted at an awkward angle as he grabbed onto the plant like it was a lifeline because he wasn't going to die.  
Under it all was a blue shape, and behind the ringing on his ears there was yelling.  
It was like if a radio station could ever broadcast pure pain through a broken stereo.  
Everything tilted on an axis as he tried to calm himself down.  
He began to descend, but slowly, steadily.  
Ryan had landed painfully on a branch, was holding onto it like it was the only thing that could save him. It was. He was trying to drag himself down it, drag himself to get leverage, to escape.  
When Schlatt's vision had stopped swimming, and he stared down at Ryan, he could see there was still metres between him and his safe little nest, or whatever the fuck he was building.  
Reality dragged him back.  
The radio static was gone and all he could hear were the whimpers and cries of Ryan below him.  
He lowered himself onto the branch.  
He knew he'd won.

Staring at Ryan made him feel… something.  
Seeing his legs bent at such an angle, it was certainly something to behold.  
Ryan, one of the most renowned architects and builders of his time, couldn't do much to rebuild the bones in his legs now could he?  
Schlatt stepped closer, Ryan had stopped trying to move now and was simply writhing in pain, lying on his back and gritting his teeth at the sky.  
His hands were pressed together, he was hissing something under his breath, broken by the pained cries of someone that'd just crippled themselves, someone that was about to die. It filled him with some kind of feeling.  
There are no atheists in foxholes, as the saying goes.  
Schlatt was almost stood over him now, and he was shaking. Oh, he was shaking.  
Both of them were shaking, trembling.  
He stared at Ryan, and Ryan's one eye stared right back. The patch over his other was damp, damper than his cheeks, damper than the back of Schlatt's neck. Schlatt stared past him, staring at at the nest, the tangled mess of branches.  
Ryan's bag was there, the blue patch distinguishable, but there was one lying next to it, right next to it, against it. A bag with a dark green patch, a patch he recognised.  
Ryan had teamed.  
Ryan had teamed just as Schlatt had teamed.  
Ryan had a friend, an ally, whereas Schlatt didn't.  
Not anymore.

The first death, the very first death…  
Wilbur…  
He wasn't going to cry.  
He could still see it: he and Wilbur giving chase, giving chase to Altrive, someone who wouldn't dare turn his weapons against anyone in the arena even if they wanted to kill him, even if it cost him his life.  
They were both giving chase, because they were ruthless, ruthless and preyed on the weak.  
Altrive had tricked them to get away. He never turned a weapon on them, which he very well could have done, but he never raised a finger against them.  
Wilbur tripped, didn't just trip but tripped a wire, a wire that tightened around his ankle and sent him into the air, into a tree.  
Right into a tree.  
Right into a tree with enough force to take his head off.  
He remembered the sound distinctly, but he never got the chance to react because there was someone on his tail and he had to get moving. He'd moved on, purposely avoiding his periphery, because he'd rather not see the bloodied mess of brown hair and a blank face on the floor in the shrubbery.  
They hardly knew each other.

They'd talked in training, befriended each other, befriended each other with the knowledge that it was a bad idea, terrible idea, because if not both of them, one of them would die.  
And one of them did.  
And Wilbur did.  
And Wilbur died at the hands of Altrive.  
All he could remember was chasing the fleeing bag, a bag with a patch, a green patch, all he could see was green.  
Now he was seeing red.  
He was staring down at Ryan in his blue hoodie, sleeves rolled up to the elbow, and his eyes were clouding over with tears.  
He was going to cry.  
Everything he could see was red, blurry and red, and this time it wasn't because he was staring through some rose coloured glasses.  
It was rage.  
Rage towards the boy lying on the branch in front of him, defenseless. He'd lost his knife, and could barely move if his life depended on it, which it did.  
The crutch he was leaning on was about to snap, and Schlatt would be the one that snapped it.

Ryan's eye widened as he raised the arrow, holding it like a knife, a sacrificial knife, kind of poetic, or ironic in the way that something so brutal mirrored something else so sacred, but Schlatt didn't care for symbolism.  
Ryan screamed  
"No! No, please-!"  
Schlatt's lip trembled, before the tremble became a snarl. He pushed down everything he felt, all his anger, all his woe, until he felt nothing.  
Until he stared at the image of Wilbur's head lying on the forest floor and felt nothing.  
Until he stared at Ryan and felt nothing.  
An eye for an eye.  
He drove the arrow home right through his eye socket.  
The sound was sickening, the piercing screech even more so.  
He stared at the bloody, gory mess, that was still moving, and now so were his hands.  
Around his neck.  
Squeezing, tighter.  
Tighter still.  
Ryan was dead.  
Ryan was dead and he was still going, still squeezing, still stabbing him repeatedly until his skull wasn't a skull, until his hands over his face had become one with the flesh behind it, until the bones of his fingers had been broken off at the knuckle and had fallen into the eye sockets they clawed at.  
There was nothing left but a body with the head of something you'd find in a slaughterhouse.  
And Schlatt stared at it.  
He stared at his own hands and gasped for his own breath.  
It was setting in that he'd just killed a man, he'd just killed a man in cold blood.  
And that could very well happen to him.  
He wasn't invulnerable, it's not that he wasn't going to die, it's that he didn't want to.  
He was telling himself it'd be fine.  
When it wouldn't.  
Because he probably was going to die, and he probably wasn't going to win.  
There was blood all over his hands, and now everything was quite literally red.  
Red and blurry.  
He couldn't breathe.

The siren went off in the background, and it made him feel like he wanted to cut himself out of his skin.  
His bones were trembling.  
He didn't feel like he was going to win any more.  
He didn't feel like he wanted to.

"Ryan?"  
Footsteps, the rustle of tree branches.  
Schlatt didn't move.  
He just watched as the drone drifted down from the trees, from where it'd been hiding, and circled Ryan's slumped corpse, filming it as if to say...  
Just look, look at this.  
Just look at what you've done.


End file.
